I get fed up with watching depleted squads have to make do because key players are missing. I really felt for Connor Henderson during pre season, the poor lad had been given a chance to show what he could do and injury struck, the same has to be said for Frimpong last pre season but without being heartless, these are players who do not impact our season

I am reposting an article that I had written this afternoon, moments after it was published my lovely hosting company decided to suspend my account without warning. Why? That’s a good question. I wish I knew. Anyway, apologies if you have already read this earlier..

There I was last night, watching a bit of telly with the missus, helping out with the chores to add some good old fashioned browny points to my collection, having good conversation and generally feeling pretty ok about life until I foolishly decided to flick on Twitter via my mobile phone. Maybe an interview was up on the official site of one of our new signings, perhaps Abou Diaby is ready to feature on the weekend, perhaps Jack’s injury was not quite as bad as everyone thought. Let us see if I can lift my mood just a little more. Not once did I consider that I could receive bad news.

The thing that I hate about Twitter is that you get dumped in the middle of a frenzied conversation about something and you have no idea what is going on. You scroll through tons of tweets (messages for those who haven’t ventured on there yet) and there are loads of snippets of information, until I got to the bottom of it.

‘Vermaelen set to undergo operation and will miss 2 months’

Seriously? You really have to be kidding me? Will we ever catch a bloody break? It has been roughly a day or so that we received the news that our most creative midfielder will be unavailable to 2-3 months. I found that really difficult to stomach and still haven’t quite come to terms that a player who was about to take another leap forward has to sit out such a chunk of the season.

Then to make matters worse, our best defender, the guy who had Andy Carroll folded and placed firmly in his back pocket, the guy who was back to organise our back four, the guy who scores goals, the guy who is a fighter and a winner, the guy who makes his partner look 30% better than they are will also be out for roughly the same time.

If two months actually meant human two months then I think I could handle news like this a little more. Koscielny doesn’t deserve to be dropped in my eyes anyway and Per Mertesacker gives us a ‘massive’ option but Thomas Vermaelen is Tomas Vermaelen and we have been through this not so long ago. Return date is set…setback… return date is set…setback…longer time out to make sure everything is ok…setback.

Defensively (apart from the shambles that was Old Trafford) we have been strong as a team this season. We have obviously worked on set pieces, we communicate more and looked more of a unit and now that is being undone.

I am annoyed and frustrated right now so you can imagine my fury last night. Like I said yesterday we have 13 players taking part tonight, oh no, sorry it is 12 isn’t it. Thanks.

Am I really hoping that we can come through tonight without picking up anymore injuries? I am truly fed up with going over this subject over and over again but it frustrates me more than bad performances. I can handle bad performances more because there are just no excuses, we have our players on the pitch and either they do it or they don’t.

I get fed up with watching depleted squads have to make do because key players are missing. I really felt for Connor Henderson during pre season, the poor lad had been given a chance to show what he could do and injury struck, the same has to be said for Frimpong last pre season but without being heartless, these are players who do not impact our season immediately and it is far easier to deal with. But when you have to repeatedly rip out your spine season after season it is very difficult to take.

I would say the spine of our team would be Szczesny, Vermaelen, Song, Wilshere and van Persie. Two of those players are out for 2+ months while one has been and is still suspended for doing something very stupid and unnecessary. The other has had a horrible time with injuries in the past and we wince every time he goes down because of his history.

You can talk about squads until you are blue in the face but once any team starts to lose several of their key players then they will suffer. Does anyone remember when Manchester United had that defensive crisis and they got spanked by Fulham and were also beaten a week earlier at home to Aston Villa.

You really think Barcelona could have been the team that they have proved to be with the likes of Messi, Iniesta, Xavi and Pique on the treatment table at the same time for any length of time?

The only way around it is if you have a player like Carlos Tevez sitting on the bench to replace Aguero. But then knowing us, if we had them both, they would most probably run into each other during training and both would twist their knees meaning we would have to play Andrey Arshavin as a striker for six months.

I would love to point the finger at our medical team and training regime but I actually do not have one tiny bit of proof so I am certainly not best placed to make that assumption. But something, somewhere is horribly wrong.

Oh guess what? Theo Walcott is also a doubt for England and Arsenal due to a hamstring. I know, I know. It sounds like I am making it up right? So before the games tonight we are already missing.

Diaby, Wilshere, Vermaelen and possibly Walcott through injury whilst Jenkinson, Song and Gervinho are still out through suspension.

After tonight? We shall see won’t we. Yes, like the Murphy’s, I am bitter.

You know what makes me almost as bitter as injuries? UEFA.

Running that awful governing body must be a piece of cake.

• Ignore racist chanting – Check
• Extract as much money from the game as possible – Check
• Promote dodgy referee – Check
• Ban Arsene Wenger for being Arsene Wenger – Check

What exactly is the point in talking about this? Am I surprised? Of course not. It is just a joke. An unfunny one at that.

But thank the Bergkamp’s above that Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain gave us something to smile about last night. Well not all of us according to that Mirror article during the summer. We were all supposed to be incensed that we had bought yet another kid.

I guess we will be folding our arms and frowning when he takes the Premier League by storm then.

Anyway, let me leap down off my high horse and praise the teenager for a game changing cameo performance. 1-0 down and playing poorly, the mug also known Stuart Pearce sent on Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and the Arsenal new boy ripped Israel a new one. Assisting all four of the England goals in one way or another.

I now see why those Saints fans have said that Chamberlain is more talented than the 17 year old Theo Walcott. While Theo would run up a blind alley and fall into the trap of the full back, Chamberlain has that little bit of Wilshere. That little body sway, that little drag back. The kid has it, along with blistering pace.

While League one is not the Premier league, it is a great achievement to have made the team of the year against experienced professionals. With the amount of money we have spent on him, it is not hard to see that he has a very bright immediate and long term future ahead of him.

As the excellent Yankee Gunner blog mentioned today, our Carling Cup team should be pretty fun this year. I hope we go back to blooding the players that need game time. Players like Ryo, Frimpong, Miquel and company.

It looks as if Wenger has purposefully grouped a collection of Gunners together so hopefully this will be the crop of young talented players that will stay together and dominate the league for many lovely years to come.

While I am on the positive train, I think I will get off now. Good luck to all the Arsenal lads tonight, just don’t hurt yourselves! thanks.

Enjoy this rather gloomy and miserable day.

Back tomorrow *sigh*

UPDATE: My grumpy state has now slightly improved as the club have put out a statement that Sir Thomas of Vermaelen will be back in training in a month.